Nash nodded.
Cam rubbed his jaw. “Then that’s where they’ll hit first. Test our metal away from where we have the most charters to call on.”
“So we need to travel mob handed—”
“While still protecting what we have down here. So we’re gonna need Crows of our own. Tell Folk and Locke to pack a bag. If they do us right in whatever comes our way, we’ll offer them a patch when you get back,” Cam finished.
Nash shook his head. “If I’m gone, I want Locke on Orla’s detail.”
Cam’s dark brows disappeared into his hairline. “I’ve got one officer thinks these Crows can’t shit straight and my VP wants them guarding my sister. Explain that to me, brother.”
Nash held Cam’s gaze. “Do I need to?”
Heavy silence blanketed the room. Orla was everything to Nash. It made no sense that he trusted Locke enough to watch her, unless he knew something we didn’t. SomethingCamwould want to know before he left a stray Crow guarding the life of his only sister.
“Find me later,” Cam rumbled. “I ain’t agreeing to anything until you explain yourself.”
Nash broke their stare down with a shrug and addressed the rest of the table. “This run’s gonna take four days. Me and Rubes will take the front load. Saint and Mateo the back. Be quicker if we split up, but I don’t want to leave brothers isolated.”
I only heard the first part. Four days without Embry.
Fourdays.
Fuck that noise. My fluctuating mood settled on grumpy. I tuned out the conversation and focused on how shit it was gonna be being trapped in an HGV with the wrong brother. With any brother who wasn’t the lithe streak of crazy sitting next to me, jiggling his knee against mine. It was work. Club business and non-negotiable, butfuck, I wished it was him and me hitting the open road with nothing ahead but each other.
Oh yeah? Then what? You’d leave him at a Burger King while you fucked off into the sunset every month?
Hopelessness hit me, sudden and cold, a familiar emotion I mostly tempered with anger and booze, but I’d literally just signed on to being Mr Reasonable for at least the next ten minutes, so I had to fucking swallow it.
Still shook me, though.
Embry’s hand slid over my thigh, and he squeezed hard enough to let me know my face was betraying my state of mind. I met his gaze and the confusion and concern in his eyes nearly broke me.
I searched my whiplash-inducing brain for something,anything, that would make him smile. “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”
“Sun Tzu? Really?”
“I like that book.”
“Only because it’s short.”
“I like short things, chaparrito.”
Embry didn’t smile. But his softening frown belied his amusement. “If you can give me another verbatim quote, I’ll consider your argument valid.”
“You should not,” Alexei said.
Goddamn, I’d forgotten there was anyone else in the room.
I forced my gaze to the moody Russian. “Why not? It’s been a minute since he made me read it, but I swear down, it says you win the biggest wars without fighting.”
“It also preaches that an army’s greatest vulnerability comes from hesitation, so if you are to takeThe Art of Waras gospel, enforcer, you must believe that too.”
“Never said it was the fucking bible, mate.”
Beside me, Embry laughed, while Cam looked on as if every brother at the table had sprouted fucking wings. “Bollocks to this.” He stood. “I need a drink. Mateo, come with me.”
Embry was still holding my leg. Detaching myself was the last thing on earth I wanted to do. But Cam’s request felt like an order.
